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Synopsis
Sky Thorne, 48-year old Senior V.P. of fast food renegade, Tailburger, has problems. According to his tyrannical boss, Frank Fanoflincoln, a.k.a. "the Link," if Sky doesn't get the company's market share up to five percent by the end the year, he's going to lose his job and with it, any chance of collecting the pension he's months away from earning. To make matters worse, the new, can't miss Torture Me marketing campaign that Sky is counting on to spur sales is failing miserably, forcing Sky to consider the less savory option of using his best friend's pornography empire to hawk Tailburger's fried meat over the internet. Besides slumping sales, Sky's battling the rabid lobbying organization S.E.R.M.O.N. (Stop Eating Red Meat Now), a politically-motivated New York Attorney General and a dysfunctional board of directors featuring the Link's golf-obsessed triplets Ned, Ted and Fred. If all this wasn't enough, Sky's older brother, King, after stints as a rebel with Colombia's F.A.R.C. and a steward with Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, has moved in to Sky's house and begun preaching the far eastern philosophy of Qigong, assuring Sky that the path to personal happiness lies in channeling his "chee" through his eight ancient meridians. All Sky really wants is a good woman, inner peace and enough money to maintain both, but it won't be easy.
For further information about Red Meat Cures Cancer, visit the Vintage Books website.
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Reviews
From the San Francisco Chronicle:
"A first-rate comic effort, "Red Meat" will have you laughing cover to cover."
From Publishers Weekly:
"There are some undeniable gutbusters....Sheer chutzpah!"
From Terry Hummel, Former Publisher, Rolling Stone Magazine:
"Red Meat Cures Cancer is a wildly irreverent and wickedly funny romp through the lunatic fringe of American pop culture and the fast food industry. Demonstrating a style as cool as Elmore Leonard's and a mind as outrageous as Carl Hiaasen's, O'Dwyer mines his own comic gold and establishes himself as a writer to watch. You will not be disappointed!"
From the Knoxville News-Sentinel:
"Order up: one funny novel satirizing American pop culture by way of the fast-food industry....Fast-food lawsuits, new-age spiritualism, food safety and animal rights activists, the 'sex sells' mentality, corporate America and the changing definition of 'success' - O'Dwyer tackles them all in a delightfully twisted manner....It's a real deal."
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:
"This irreverent debut novel pokes fun at fast food, politics, Internet pornography, Caribbean cruising and anything that's triple fried."
From the Boston Globe:
"A world gone mad....off its axis....like a diabetic B.B. King shilling Burger King."
From Seattle Weekly:
"Funny."
From Flaunt Magazine:
"Entertaining....[with a] strangely sad though sweepingly ascendant climax."
From Java Magazine:
"Hilarious and recommended."
From Boston's Weekly Dig:
"The book is first rate. O'Dwyer knows the ground he's writing on, and the dialogue is at times brilliant. One of the better books of the year."
From Kirkus Reviews:
"A meaty, bloody slab o' satire. Schuyler ("Sky") Thorne is one of the big muckety-mucks at Tailburger, a chain of hamburger joints that gives health nuts triple coronaries just thinking about them. Their main product, "four batter-dipped, deep-fried patties of red meat and a bun, held together by five generous dollops of Cajun-style mayonnaise," holds a decent but unremarkable slice of America's drive-through burger business and it's up to Sky to bring the company around with a blistering new ad campaign. Badgered by Tailburger founder Frank Fanoflincoln (he changed his last name after becoming a Civil War buff), Sky decides to stop pretending that Tailburgers (and the ever-popular meat-flavored shake the Tailfrap) are good for people and dreams up the "Torture Your Body" idea. Things look pretty good for Sky at first. He signs up Lakers lummox Jelloteous Junderstack as spokesman and talks film auteur Ship Plankton into inserting Tailburger into the plot of his new movie, Dongwood. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when Jello's health hits a few cholesterol-fueled snags, Dongwood reveals itself to be a massive flop, and the rabid lobbying group and challenged spellers SERMON ("Stop Eating Red Meat Now") files a class-action lawsuit against Tailburger. In the middle of it all, Sky gets involved with Muffet Meaney, SERMON's zealous but libidinous leader. To prevent Tailburger from completely bottoming out, Sky approaches his friend Cal Perkins, who, unbeknownst to most everyone but Sky, has made his millions in adult entertainment (everyone else thinks he runs a wholesome jam business). Thus is born the "Nail Some Tail Sweepstakes." O'Dwyer, a healthcare-industry lawyer, knows that subtlety is not the way to play this and so paints Red Meat Cures Cancer with broad, primary strokes burnished with a healthy dose of ribaldry. Like Christopher Buckley without the subtlety, O'Dwyer's first vaults over any ideas of good taste into a realm of deep-fried comic genius."
From the Tennessean (Nashville):
"A rip-roaring spoof of the fast food industry and a withering satire of pork barrel politics, corruption, nepotism, toadyism, bribery, and blackmail, Red Meat Cures Cancer is a veritable primer of political incorrectness. Raunchy, risque, and ribald, this ribbing of American pop culture is a comic romp - a hoot, a howl, a sidesplitting takeoff. If Starbuck O'Dwyer's novel doesn't make you laugh hysterically, you don't have a funny bone in your body."
From the Canadian Press (newswire service):
"An outrageously funny satire!"
From the Contra Costa Times:
"Funny."
From NadaMucho.com:
"O'Dwyer deftly walks the fine line between archetype and stereotype, delicately balancing an outrageous cast of familiar characters that might have come across as stale in lesser hands. RMCC is a double bacon burger with extra cheese: delicious and enough to satisfy."
From the Times-Picayune (New Orleans):
"Highly original."
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News
Red Meat Cures Cancer Now Available Wirelessly For Amazon's Kindle Reader
Effective December 18, 2007, Red Meat Cures Cancer has been made available
by Random House, in conjunction with Amazon.com, for wireless delivery to Amazon's
Kindle, a new wireless, portable reading device. Red Meat Cures Cancer is one of the
initial 90,000 titles being offered which may be auto-delivered in less than one minute to
any Kindle reader without use of a computer or cables. For more information, go to Amazon.com.
2007 One Book One Vancouver Program Selects Red Meat Cures Cancer
The Vancouver Public Library recently selected Red Meat Cures Cancer by author Starbuck O'Dwyer to be featured as part of its 2007 One Book One Vancouver program, an annual initiative designed to promote literature throughout the city of Vancouver and its surrounding area. Along with the primary title of My Year of Meats by Ruth Ozeki, O'Dwyer's book was one of eight corollary fiction titles recommended by the program to Vancouver readers.
March 2007 Issue of Midwest Homes Magazine Features Red Meat Cures Cancer
The March 2007 issue of Midwest Homes Magazine, a Minneapolis-area home and lifestyle publication, featured Starbuck O'Dwyer's Red Meat Cures Cancer as part of its front-cover article "Books That Cook." Featured in the article was a large Minneapolis-area book club that chose to read O'Dwyer's "Red Meat" and prepare a special meal of gourmet hamburgers and french fries.
Princeton University Hosts Authors Caldwell, Oates and O'Dwyer
Princeton University, in conjunction with the Princeton University Bookstore, welcomed noted authors Ian Caldwell, Joyce Carol Oates and Starbuck O'Dwyer as part of its 2004 Reunions festivities held over the Memorial Day weekend. Caldwell's Rule of Four, Oates's I Am No One You Know and O'Dwyer's Red Meat Cures Cancer were the featured works as each author gave readings and signed books for the assembled audience. Caldwell and O'Dwyer are both Princeton alumni while Oates leads Princeton's creative writing program as the Roger S. Berlind Distinguished Professor of the Humanities.
Starbuck O'Dwyer Interviewed on ESPN 2's Cold Pizza
On April 13, 2004, Starbuck O'Dwyer was interviewed on ESPN 2's Cold Pizza in the show's midtown Manhattan studio by co-host Kit Hoover. The segment focused on O'Dwyer's satiric take on the fast food industry and his novel Red Meat Cures Cancer.
Entertainment Weekly Features Red Meat Cures Cancer
Entertainment Weekly magazine, in its March 12, 2004, post-Oscar issue, featured Red Meat Cures Cancer by Starbuck O'Dwyer in its "Opening Acts," a portion of its book review section that highlights the opening words of new novels getting national attention. EW included the following from the first page of the book: "Frank Fanoflincoln, my boss, is a fat man. I'm not talking circus fat or freakish fat or the huge, if I eat three more pints of Ben and Jerry's they'll need to move a wall to get me out of my house, kind of fat. But he's working on it."
Starbucks Coffee Company Hosts Starbuck O'Dwyer
On Friday February 27, 2004, Starbucks Coffee Company hosted author Starbuck O'Dwyer at its world headquarters in Seattle, WA, as part of the company's national authors program. Starbuck was invited by Starbucks to come read from his hit satire "Red Meat Cures Cancer" to an audience of Starbucks employees and to sign and discuss the book.
Random House Acquires Worldwide Rights to Starbuck O'Dwyer's Red Meat Cures Cancer
Random House, Inc. has acquired the worldwide rights to Starbuck O'Dwyer's novel, Red Meat Cures Cancer, via a December, 2002 auction. In addition to the North American trade and mass-market paperback rights, Random House, which will release the book as part of their Vintage Books line in February of 2004, also acquired the hardcover and paperback foreign rights to the book.
Red Meat Cures Cancer Wins Bronze for 2002 Book of the Year
Red Meat Cures Cancer, a satire by novelist Starbuck O'Dwyer, was named the bronze medal winner in the humor category for the 2002 Book of the Year Awards at BookExpo America in Los Angeles Friday, May 30th. The title was nominated in both the humor and pop culture categories by ForeWord Magazine, which recognizes excellence in publishing from independent and university presses. First, second and third place award winners in forty-seven categories were announced at a special program where luminaries from the small press community joined in celebrating the finalists and winners along with a proclamation of the $1,500 Editor's Choice Prizes in fiction and non-fiction. Last year's Editor's Choice Prize for Fiction, Peace Like a River, went on to achieve best-seller status.
Red Meat Cures Cancer Finishes Second in 2003 IPPY Awards
Starbuck O'Dwyer's critically-acclaimed novel, Red Meat Cures Cancer, has been named the runner-up co-finalist in the humor category of the 2003 Independent Publisher Book Awards, commonly known as the IPPYs. The Independent Publisher Book Awards, launched in 1996, are designed to bring increased recognition to independent, university, and small presses in North America. Awards were handed out at BookExpo America, the largest industry trade show, in Los Angeles on Friday, May 30th.
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